THE BEET SUGAR INDUSTRY. 201 



Stamner's number of value is fully as simple as the present graded method and more 

 accurate. Either plan of grading encourages the production of rich beets. Stamner's 

 method is to beets what the Babcock test is to cream. But lots of farmers are suspicious 

 of either test, and prefer a straight price, regardless of quality. That is why it is adhered 

 to at Lehi and at the Spreckels factories, though theso beets are almost always well above 

 12 and 80, so that there is little risk to the factory and the bother of testing is avoided. The 

 other factories in this country grade the price, but not all on exactly the same basis. 



THE UNITED 8TATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



published in the spring of 1898, a bulletin giving a comprehensive account of all its work 

 with the sugar beet up to that time. Writing in January, '99, Dr. H. W. Wiley, the 

 chemist, says that the analytical data obtained from beets grown in '98 corroborated 

 entirely the results of the season of '97. "The best results have been from beets 

 grown in New York, Michigan, northern Indiana, northern Ohio, Wisconsin and Minne- 

 sota. I do not think that a final study of our data will cause any change, either in the 

 area mapped out as probably suitable for the industry nor in the distribution within that 

 area of favorable localities." 



NEW POINTS FROM THE SOUTH. 



Florida is becoming very much interested in sugar cane. Analyses made at the 

 Florida experiment station of the crop grown during 1898 showed from 20 to 29 per cent, 

 sucrose. The average of the station's crop when harvested Dec. 5 was 25 per cent. The 

 station has demonstrated that with Spanish moss the crude juice of the sugar cane can 

 be nicely clarified and the sugar made therefrom given a light brown color. It can be 

 further whitened by refining with clay that has been slightly blued by the introduction 

 of a little powdered ultramarine. The effect is an apparently white sugar, really no purer 

 or better than the yellow article, but which meets the public demand and sells for a better 

 price. These methods of making a colored product of sugar and syrup on the farm with 

 comparatively rude and expensive methods are attracting great attention and caus- 

 ing a large increase in the cultivation of sugar cane in Florida. 



THINNING AND CLEANING BEETS, LA GRANDE, OREGON. 



